


We Had Us

by melonsflesh



Category: K (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-31
Updated: 2014-08-31
Packaged: 2018-02-15 14:17:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2232102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melonsflesh/pseuds/melonsflesh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“What now?”</p><p>“You dance. Put your hand on my shoulder,” Saruhiko instructed as his right fingers held Misaki’s left hand and his left palm slid to his back. “You wanted to learn how to dance properly, didn’t you?”</p><p>“Does it have to be now?”</p><p>“When, then?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	We Had Us

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: imagine your OTP slow-dancing to a song during the apocalypse and they both know they’re going to die soon (from imagineyourotp@tumblr).

 

They weren’t that special, after all.

 

 
    
    
      _
                    Half past four—
        
      _
    

 

How painfully easy it is to feel powerless when you know the world is coming to an end and you can’t do absolutely nothing to prevent it. Because the menace is too big, because the universe doesn’t seem to want you alive anymore and you are too insignificant to stand a chance.

“This sucks.”

It didn’t seem like a big deal at first. The days withered away as always and there was nothing unusual about the always prominent, reddened sunsets—

“Aaah...”

—until it’s been three months since the banking system no longer existed, two months since the last stores standing had been wiped out by desperate souls—

“... dammit.”

—two months since the fire first appeared high in the sky. And Misaki still had a couple of unused coins for the now old arcade.

Misaki didn’t seem to mind the world was going to end that day; the boredom and disappointment seemed to be even stronger than extinction itself. Their surroundings seemed to have given up before the birds did, and instead of strident voices and chaos, there was nothing but desolation and resignation. Silence. And even the more desperate ones were no longer around. No looting, no need to worry about unwanted guests around. Only their natural demise. And them.

And who in their right mind would even want to get close to a couple of hooligans who were capable of summoning fire itself anyways, like the same fire that became stronger and more arrogant day by day, the same fire that would sooner or later obliterate their bodies.

People were sick of the fire. They would see it, hostile and high and beyond the sky, threatening them with its mere presence like a mocking God, getting closer to them with each week that passed by. People came to  _hate_  fire.

They had no choice but to adapt.

Misaki didn’t seem to mind that day, probably because the view wasn’t any different. At least not from where he was sitting on the dry asphalt, not wanting to face the upcoming cataclysm as his back pressed heavily against Saruhiko’s.

“Hey, Saru,” he asked, unconcerned and pointlessly, already knowing the answer to his question, “you think there’s any arcade we forgot about?”

“We’ve already checked most of them. And it’s useless without electricity supplies.”

“Yeah, I know.”

Saruhiko lifted his head. His eyes fixed in the many scattered fireballs dancing around their leader and bound to hit their land anytime soon, and briefly wondered if it would really hurt,  _burn_  as much as it seemed to.

\- - - - - - - - - -

The first time they saw it, it was no more special than any other star in the sky. It did grow bigger in a matter of weeks, though, just enough for them to be able to see it without the aid of any optical device. Next to the big, menacing one, there would soon born a brethren of smaller fireballs. Unlike the flames that emerged from their bodies —courtesy of the Red King— they were a furious crimson and gold they had never seen before.

Misaki thought it was amazing.

He cried to sleep that night. Saruhiko was angry.

The van they found themselves depending on had enough space for the both of them, and was small enough for the muffled sobs bouncing through its walls to echo throughout the room all night long.

Saruhiko hated it. The anger was too much, too hot and boiling inside his veins, that it dried the first signs of humidity gathering in the corner of his eyes before even having the chance to reach his cheeks.

\- - - - - - - - - -

 

_  
_
    
    
      _
                    Half past four—
        
      _
    

 

Saruhiko glanced at his wrist watch and stood up without any warning, and the abrupt withdrawal almost made Misaki fall back against the ground.

“W-wha—hey! Where—” Misaki turned around, and cringed for the first time in the day at the contrast between Saruhiko’s frame and the red world beyond. “Where’re you goin’?”

Saruhiko didn’t reply as he walked and left Misaki behind, and it wasn’t as if he wanted Misaki to stop talking or fidgeting uncomfortably against his back, but he would rather try filling the atmosphere with other kind of thoughts than let the redhead’s little mind be disturbed with the inevitable.

Silently, he hopped into the old van and rummaged through some dusty boxes, and found the old MP3 player he himself had fixed some weeks ago —when what Misaki considered as ‘fixing’ translated into hitting the device against whatever surface was available, thus forcing him to step in.

He turned it on, took him some seconds before eventually finding the song he was looking for, and connected the device to the van’s stereo, adjusting the volume and seeking the redhead’s puzzled look to confirm the sound had reached his ears.

He walked out of the van and toward Misaki and reached out for his hand. Misaki took it, the confusion never faltering from his face as he tried to recognize the melody, to no avail, and his body rose from the ground.

“What now?”

“You dance. Put your hand on my shoulder,” Saruhiko instructed as his right fingers held Misaki’s left hand and his left palm slid to his back. “You wanted to learn how to dance properly, didn’t you?”

 

 
    
    
      _
                    The estimated time—
        
      _
    

 

“Does it have to be now?”

“When, then?”

When, indeed, when the future as they thought they knew it was no longer available for them.

They weren’t that special, after all. Saruhiko knew that better than anyone, but Misaki’s hope was greater, greater than his, than anyone’s, and it gave Saruhiko hope, too. It was hope that took the form of the redheaded young man anxiously looking for the unused coins in his pockets. It took the form of Misaki waking him up excitedly because he thought he had seen a falcon circling in the sky. It took the form of the warmth embracing Saruhiko’s cold hands when they intertwined their fingers as they slept. It gave Saruhiko hope. It helped him  _pretend_ , and believe.

The moment felt eternal, but it had only been three minutes and a new song was playing.

“Hey, why’s  _your_ hand still on my back. ‘m not some girl, you know. I got this.”

“I  _know_. Don’t be so noisy. I’m leading, that’s all.”

They were all they have, and there they were, powerless and exposed under the imminent light of the flare illuminating their faces and crushing their hope while their feet danced —or tried to— to the rhythm of some melody Misaki didn’t even know.

He wasn’t sure he was even listening to it.

But he had hope. And he had Saruhiko, too.

“You ‘ _got this_ ’. You’re terrible at this, Misaki. You’re going to step on someone’s foot if you’re not careful.”

“Well you’re terrible at teaching!”

“Tch, you’re terrible at learning. That’s different.”

“Shut up.”

“Right foot, back.”

“Got it.”

“That’s your left.”

“Dammit.”

\- - - - - - - - - -

They danced for about eight minutes.

“They day you get students ‘m gonna warn the shit out of them.”

“Go ahead. I don’t plan on doing this for a living.”

It was amazing, how there was no future to think about, only clumsy dance moves and whoever their feet were trying to fool.

A distraction. It was what Misaki needed.

But the moment Saruhiko saw Misaki’s eyes divert from his and twist themselves in what he learned to recognize as  _fear_ and panic, he knew.

He knew Misaki had lost hope. The fire reflected in the redhead’s glazed irises, as well as the way Misaki’s fingers clenched tighter around his hand and shoulder, warned him as much. And Misaki thought the red behind Saruhiko had become  _bigger, hadn’t it_ ; it wasn’t that big eight minutes ago, when Saruhiko walked into the van. Saruhiko’s body was bigger then, and now it wasn’t, even though they were few centimeters apart.

It wasn’t, _it wasn’t, the red was bigger, and stronger, and closer, and—_

Saruhiko’s fingers gave his waist a little squeeze to call for his attention.

“Let’s switch.”

Misaki nodded absently as they turned, focused on Saruhiko’s weird smile, and tried to fight the ardor in his eyes, and he thought that, if he was going to cry, he wouldn’t mind if Saruhiko mocked him and laughed at him.

Only once, Saruhiko watched the golden sky at Misaki’s back starting to mutate into a permanent red. It was beautiful and terrifying, but it was a red the redhead had never imagined it would frighten him so much. It scared Misaki, so it was hideous, and Saruhiko loathed it.

“Saru,” he called, feeling the first thin strings of panic tensing his muscles, “I... I don’t know these songs.”

“If I had picked songs you knew, you’d have known how they went. Just try to focus on how this one goes.”

“O-okay.”

They kept dancing, for about thirteen minutes.

Saruhiko glanced at the wrist watch on his right hand, and he knew.

 

_  
_
    
    
      
        
          _Half past four—_
        
      
    

 

_  
_
    
    
      
        
          _The estimated time—_
        
      
    

 

He knew.

Four twenty-seven.

 

_  
_
    
    
      
        
          _Four—_
        
      
    

 

Misaki didn’t exactly  _know_ , but he imagined, he assumed, and choked back a cry, closed his eyes as tight as he could and felt his knees slowly giving up under his weight.

 

_  
_
    
    
      
        
          _Half past—_
        
      
    

 

_  
_
    
    
      
        
          _For the impact is—_
        
      
    

 

“Misaki.”

 

_  
_
    
    
      
        _Just three minutes. Four minutes. Maybe even five. More. Less._ _Who cares._
      
    

 

“Misaki, look at me,” Saruhiko uttered, louder. And Misaki did. He opened his eyes and wondered if there was a single moment that Saruhiko hadn't been looking at him. He felt there wasn't.

The furious light hitting Saruhiko’s face allowed Misaki to discover all the otherwise hidden details in his skin, that pale skin that mingled with the radiant flare tainted his cheeks with some unique shade of pink, and that was the only good use Misaki thought the overwhelming red had.

“S-Saru—”

“It’s okay.”

Saruhiko smiled at him with a sad face, a face Misaki tried to memorize as he mimicked his smile.

They were everything they had.

The ground burned under their feet.

Four thirty-two.

 

_  
_
    
    
      
        
          _More. Less._
        
      
    

 

The estimated time for the impact was half past four.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote something sad (I think?) for once.
> 
> Thank you for reading! ♥


End file.
